Around the World: Brazil Unit Study & Rainforest Biome

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For the month of February we spent a lot of time learning about the country of Brazil. For science, we also learned all about the Amazon rainforest. We did our usual routine for learning about a new country, but also added in some other great resources for Brazil. Scroll to the bottom for links to ALL the countries we have previously completed and to get an idea of how we complete our units. We typically spend 2 weeks on each country.

Brazil

To start our unit we looked at the map of Brazil in the book Maps by Aleksandra Mizielinska and read some of the facts from the DK Countries of the World. We color the outline of the country & label its major parts, or the specific ones we will be studying. For Brazil we labeled the capital, Amazon Rainforest, Amazon River, and major oceans. We also always add the population and language spoken. For each country we also read about and paint a small flag of the country provided by the Traveling the World guide. After this we love to watch some videos on YouTube and read from our favorite book Children Just Like Me.

I downloaded and used a lot of THIS guide on Brazil from Little World Wanderers (it’s FREE and amazing.) This guide was full of so much information, fun hands-on activities, games, and recipes. We learned about the Christ the Redeemer statue, made some Bridgadeiro (traditional Brazilian desert,) and played many rounds of Luta De Gallo. This guide helped me a lot and made learning a lot of fun!

We also learned about Carnival in Rio De Janeiro from Children Just Like Me Celebrations and learned a simple Samba step from THIS YouTube video. For movie night we watched the cartoon movie Rio.

We read lots of books based in Brazil, but mostly focused on the Amazon Rainforest. (I’ll share those below.) Some books we enjoyed, but not pictured; Along the River by Vanina Stakoff and The Dancing Turtle by Pleasant DeSpain. Some great read alouds; Magic Treehouse Afternoon on the Amazon, or American Girl Lea Clark books (Lea Dives In, Lea Leads the Way.)

At the end of our studies we celebrated by playing Brazil Bingo and doing some fun I Spy Brazil pages.

Amazon Rainforest

Now this part might get a little long since there is so much you can learn about! **Take note that we completed our entire rainforest unit over 4 weeks while we learned about Brazil and as we started learning about Peru. This is also the second time we are learning about the rainforest and we learned about different things, so in this post I have added a few activities we did previously AND everything we did this time around.

Books

There are so many great books about the rainforest or particular animals that live there. Above are some that we read and enjoyed. Some books not pictured; The Rainforest Grew All Around by Susan K. Mitchell, and The Great Kapok Tree by Lynne Cherry, Jabuti the Tortoise by Gerald McDermott, and Abayomi the Brazilian Puma by Darcy Pattison & Kitty Harvill. Some great reference books that we used while learning about the Amazon Rainforest and Amazon River: Atlas of Animal Adventures by Rachel Williams and Amazing Rivers by Julie Agnone & Kerry Hyndman.

The Wild Kratts have a full DVD called Amazin’ Amazon Adventure (streamed on Prime) or Rainforest Rescue, that are full of great information on different animals in the Amazon Rainforest.

*Don’t get overwhelmed by all these books; you don’t have to read all of them to learn about these subjects. I get asked often how we get through so many books. I like to have many displayed in our school area for my kids to grab & read out of curiosity. We usually read 2-3 picture books each night before bed, so we get through many that way in a 2 week period.

Layers of the Rainforest

This time, when learning about the rainforest, I wanted to focus on the different layers. I printed THIS simple pack that had a fun lift the flap page that we added to our notebooks. I had them write an important characteristic of each layer and add one animal that could be found there. (Animals & more provided in this pack.) I also sent my kids outside to collect sticks, leaves, flowers, grass, etc. to create their own version of the layers of the rainforest and label them.

With each biome we have been studying this year, I have had my kids create a diorama. You can read about our other biome studies HERE. Instead of completing a diorama this time, we created a giant rainforest tree in our schoolroom. We used carboard, painted brown for the trunk, construction paper for the leaves, and green crate paper for vines. (Fold a piece of green construction paper in half and draw half of a leaf; cut it out and unfold it. Use this leaf to trace many more.) I typed the layers of the rainforest on my computer and had them place them in the correct spot.

We have learned about many animals and insects that live in the rainforest. These are the ones we did a few years ago. Toucans, sloths, frogs, and butterflies: (the sloths are cut out of cardboard and have clothespins for legs.)

You can also build a rainforest terrarium, like we did a few years back. Check out some instructions HERE.

This time we learned about armadillos, anacondas, and macaws. They also added some morpho butterflies and red-eyed tree frog drawings they did by Art for Kids Hub drawing tutorials on YouTube. Here is how we made some of our crafts:

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I think I shared everything we did, haha. We had a lot of fun with this unit and I hope you do too! There are so many possibilities!

Next is our Peru unit study and you can read about it HERE. It is a lot shorter because a lot of what we did is already in this post as we finished the rainforest. Still some great projects and additional resources too!

Here are the other countries we have completed this school year:

Around the World: China Unit Study

Around the World: Japan Unit Study

Around the World: Thailand Unit Study

Around the World: India Unit Study

Around the World: Egypt Unit Study

Around the World: Antarctica Unit Study

Around the World: Australia Unit Study

Around the World: Peru Unit Study

Thanks for getting through this whole thing! Wishing you a great week!

– Lindsay